FORTUNATELY Jessica Lawton’s humble1 little business enterprise began to bring in returns before her slender store of money was quite exhausted2. Even more fortunate, at least in her estimation, was the fact that the lion’s share of this welcome patronage3 came from the poor working-girls of the village. When the venture was a month old, there was nearly enough work to occupy all her time, and, taking into account the season, this warranted her in believing that she had succeeded.
The result had not come without many anxious days, made bitter alike by despairing tremors4 for the future and burning indignation at the insults and injuries of the present. Now that these had in a measure abated5, she felt, in looking back upon them, that the fear of failure was always the least of her troubles. At the worst, the stock which, through Mrs. Fairchild’s practical kindness, she had been able to bring from Tecumseh, could be sold for something like its cost. Her father’s help had sufficed for nearly all the changes needed in the small tenement6, and she had money enough to pay the rent until May.
The taking over of Lucinda was a more serious matter, for the girl had been a wage-earner, and would be entitled to complain if it turned out that she had been decoyed away from the factory on an empty promise. But Lucinda, so far from complaining, seemed exceptionally contented7. It was true that she gave no promise of ever acquiring skill as a milliner, and she was not infrequently restless under the discipline which Jessica, with perhaps exaggerated caution, strove to impose, but she worked with great diligence in their tiny kitchen, and served customers in the store with enthusiasm if not finesse8. The task of drilling her into that habit of mind which considers finger-nails and is mindful of soap was distinctly onerous9, and even now had reached only a stage in which progress might be reported; but much could be forgiven a girl who was so cheerful and who really tried so hard to do her share.
As for the disagreeable experiences, which had once or twice been literally10 terrifying, the girl still grew sick at heart with rage and shame and fear that they might jeopardize11 her plans, when she thought of them. In their ruder aspects they were divisible into two classes. A number of young men, sometimes in groups of twos or threes, but more often furtively12 and alone, had offensively sought to make themselves at home in the store, and had even pounded on the door in the evening after it was shut and bolted; a somewhat larger number of rough factory-girls, or idlers of the factory-girl class, had come from time to time with the obvious intention of insulting her. These latter always appeared in gangs, and supported one another in cruel giggling13 and in coarse inquiries14 and remarks.
After a few painfully futile15 attempts to meet and rebuff these hostile waves, Jessica gave up the effort, and arranged matters so that she could work in the living-room beyond, within call if she were needed, but out of the visual range of her persecutors. Lucinda encountered them instead, and gave homely16 but vigorous Rolands for their Olivers. It was in the interchange of these remarks that the chief danger, to the struggling little business lay, for if genuine customers heard them, why, there was an end to everything. It is not easy to portray17 the girl’s relief as week after week went by, and time brought not only no open scandal, but a marked diminution18 of annoyance19. When Jessica was no longer visible, interest in the sport lagged. To come merely for the sake of baiting Lucinda was not worth the while. And when these unfriendly visits slackened, and then fell off almost altogether, Jessica hugged to her breast the notion that it was because these rough young people had softened21 toward and begun to understand and sympathize with her.
It was the easier to credit this kindly22 hypothesis in that she had already won the suffrages23 of a considerable circle of working-girls. To explain how this came about would be to analyze24 many curious and apparently25 contradictory26 phases of untutored human nature, and to recount many harmless little stratagems27 and well-meant devices, and many other frankly28 generous words and actions which came from hearts not the less warm because they beat amid the busy whir of the looms29, or throbbed30 to the time of the seamstress’s needle.
Jessica’s own heart was uplifted with exultation31, sometimes, when she thought upon the friendliness32 of these girls. So far as she knew and believed, every one of them was informed as to her past, and there was no reason beyond their own inclination33 why they should take stock in her intentions for the future. To a slender few, originally suggested by Lucinda, and then confirmed by her own careful scrutiny34, she had confided35 the crude outlines of her scheme—that is, to build up a following among the toilers of her own sex, to ask from this following no more than a decent living for work done, and to make this work include not merely the details of millinery and hints about dress, but a general mental and material helpfulness, to take practical form step by step as the means came to hand and the girls themselves were ready for the development. Whenever she had tried to put this into words, its melancholy36 vagueness had been freshly apparent to her, but the girls had believed in her! That was the great thing.
And they had brought others, and spread the favorable report about, until even now, in the dead season, lying half way between Christmas and the beginning of Lent, she was kept quite busy. To be sure, her patrons were not governed much by these holiday dates at any time, and she was undoubtedly37 doing their work better and more cheaply than it could ever have been done for them before, but their good spirit in bringing it was none the less evident for that.
And out of the contact with this good spirit, Jessica began to be dimly conscious of getting great stores of strength for herself. If it could be all like this, she felt that her life would be ideally happy. She had not the skill of mind to separate her feelings, and contrast and weigh them one against the other, but she knew clearly enough that she was doing what afforded her keen enjoyment38, and it began to be apparent that merely by doing it she would come to see more clearly, day by day, how to expand and ennoble her work. The mission which Annie Fairchild had urged upon her and labored39 to fit her for, and which she had embraced and embarked40 upon with only the vaguest ideas as to means or details or specific aims, was unfolding itself inspiringly before her.
During this period she wrote daily to the good woman who had sent her upon this work—short letters setting forth41 tersely42 the events and outcome of the day—and the answers which came twice a week helped greatly to strengthen her.
And do not doubt that often she stood in grave need of strength! The mere20 matter of regular employment itself was still more or less of a novelty to her; regular hours still found her physically43 rebellious44. The restraints of a shop, of studied demeanor45, of frugal46 meals, of no intimate society save that of one dull girl,—these still wore gratingly upon her nerves, and produced periodical spasms47 of depression and gloom, in which she was much tortured by doubts about herself and the utility of what she was doing.
Sometimes, too, these doubts took the positive form of temptation—of a wild kind of longing48 to get back again into the atmosphere where bright lights shone on beautiful dresses, and the hours went swiftly, gayly by with jest, and song, and the sparkle of the amber49 air-beads rising in the tall wine-glasses. There came always afterward50 the memory of those other hours which dragged most gruesomely, when the daylight made all tawdry and hateful once more, and heartaches ruled where smiles had been. Yet still these unbidden yearnings would come, and then the girl would set her teeth tight together, and thrust her needle through the mutinous51 tears till they were exorcised.
It had been in her unshaped original plan to do a good deal for her father, but this proved to be more easily contemplated52 than done. Once the little rooms had been made habitable for her and Lucinda, there remained next to nothing for him to do. He came around every morning, when some extraordinary event, such as a job of work or a fire, did not interfere53, and offered his services, but he knew as well as they did that this was a mere amiable54 formality. He developed a great fondness for sitting by the stove in Jessica’s small working room, and either watching her industrious55 fingers or sleeping calmly in his chair. Perhaps the filial instinct was not strong in Lucinda’s composition; perhaps it had been satiated by over-close contact during those five years of Jessica’s absence. At any rate, the younger girl did not enjoy Ben’s presence as much as her sister seemed to, and almost daily detracted from his comfort by suggestions that the apartments were very small, and that a man hanging around all day took up a deplorable amount of room.
It had been Jessica’s notion, too, that she and her sister would walk out in the evenings under the escort of their father, and thus secure themselves from misapprehension. But Lucinda rebelled flatly against this, at least until Ben had some new clothes, and the money for these was not forthcoming. Jessica did find it possible to spare a dollar or so to her father weekly, and there had been a nebulous understanding that this was to be applied56 to raiment; but the only change in his appearance effected by this so far had been a sporadic57 accession of startlingly white paper collars.
There were other minor58 disappointments—portions of her plan, so to speak, which had failed to materialize—but the net result of a month’s trial was distinctly hopeful. Although most of such work as had come to her was from the factory-girls, not a few ladies had visited the little store, and made purchases or given orders. Among these she liked best of all the one who owned the house; a very friendly old person, with corkscrew curls and an endless tongue—Miss Tabitha Wilcox. She had already made two bonnets59 for her, and the elderly lady had been so pleasant and talkative that she had half resolved, when next she came in, to unfold to her the scheme which now lay nearest to her heart.
This was nothing less than securing permission to use a long-deserted and roomy building which stood in the yard, at the back of the one she occupied, as a sort of evening club for the working-girls of the town. Jessica had never been in this building, but so far as she could see through the stained and dismantled60 windows, where the drifts did not render approach impossible, it had formerly61 been a dwelling-house, and later had been used in part as a carpenter’s shop.
To get this, and to fit it up simply but comfortably as a place where the tired factory and sewing girls could come in the evening, to read or talk or play games if they liked, to merely sit still and rest if they chose, but in either case to be warm and contented and sheltered from the streets and the deadly boredom62 of squalid lodgings63, became little by little her abiding64 ambition. She had spoken tentatively to some of the girls about it, and they were all profoundly enthusiastic over the plan.
It remained to enlist65 the more fortunate women whose assistance could alone make the plan feasible. Jessica had essayed to get at the parson’s wife, Mrs. Turner; but that lady, after having been extremely cordial, had unaccountably all at once turned icy cold, and cut the girl dead in the street. I said “unaccountably,” but Jessica was not at all at a loss to comprehend the change, and the bitterness of the revelation had thrown her into an unusually deep fit of depression. For a time it had seemed to her hopeless to try to find another confidante in that class which despised and shrank from her. Then Miss Tabitha’s pleasant words and transparent66 good-heartedness had lifted her out of her despondency, and she was almost resolved now to approach her on the subject of the house iii the back yard.
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1
humble
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| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
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exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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patronage
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| n.赞助，支援，援助；光顾，捧场 | |
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tremors
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| 震颤( tremor的名词复数 )； 战栗； 震颤声； 大地的轻微震动 | |
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abated
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| 减少( abate的过去式和过去分词 )； 减去； 降价； 撤消（诉讼） | |
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tenement
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| n.公寓；房屋 | |
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contented
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| adj.满意的，安心的，知足的 | |
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finesse
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| n.精密技巧，灵巧，手腕 | |
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onerous
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| adj.繁重的 | |
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literally
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| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
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jeopardize
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| vt.危及，损害 | |
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furtively
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| adv. 偷偷地, 暗中地 | |
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giggling
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| v.咯咯地笑( giggle的现在分词 ) | |
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inquiries
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| n.调查( inquiry的名词复数 )；疑问；探究；打听 | |
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futile
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| adj.无效的，无用的，无希望的 | |
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homely
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| adj.家常的，简朴的；不漂亮的 | |
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portray
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| v.描写，描述；画(人物、景象等) | |
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diminution
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| n.减少；变小 | |
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annoyance
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| n.恼怒，生气，烦恼 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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suffrages
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| （政治性选举的）选举权，投票权( suffrage的名词复数 ) | |
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analyze
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| vt.分析，解析 (=analyse) | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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contradictory
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| adj.反驳的，反对的，抗辩的；n.正反对，矛盾对立 | |
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stratagems
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| n.诡计，计谋( stratagem的名词复数 )；花招 | |
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frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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looms
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| n.织布机( loom的名词复数 )v.隐约出现，阴森地逼近( loom的第三人称单数 )；隐约出现，阴森地逼近 | |
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throbbed
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| 抽痛( throb的过去式和过去分词 )； （心脏、脉搏等）跳动 | |
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exultation
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| n.狂喜，得意 | |
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32
friendliness
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| n.友谊，亲切，亲密 | |
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inclination
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| n.倾斜；点头；弯腰；斜坡；倾度；倾向；爱好 | |
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scrutiny
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| n.详细检查，仔细观察 | |
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confided
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| v.吐露（秘密，心事等）( confide的过去式和过去分词 )；（向某人）吐露（隐私、秘密等） | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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enjoyment
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| n.乐趣；享有；享用 | |
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labored
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| adj.吃力的，谨慎的v.努力争取(for)( labor的过去式和过去分词 )；苦干；详细分析；（指引擎）缓慢而困难地运转 | |
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40
embarked
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| 乘船( embark的过去式和过去分词 )； 装载； 从事 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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tersely
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| adv. 简捷地, 简要地 | |
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43
physically
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| adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律 | |
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44
rebellious
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| adj.造反的，反抗的，难控制的 | |
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45
demeanor
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| n.行为；风度 | |
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46
frugal
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| adj.节俭的，节约的，少量的，微量的 | |
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47
spasms
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| n.痉挛( spasm的名词复数 )；抽搐；（能量、行为等的）突发；发作 | |
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48
longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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amber
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| n.琥珀；琥珀色；adj.琥珀制的 | |
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50
afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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51
mutinous
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| adj.叛变的，反抗的；adv.反抗地，叛变地；n.反抗，叛变 | |
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52
contemplated
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| adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式 | |
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53
interfere
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| v.(in)干涉，干预；(with)妨碍，打扰 | |
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54
amiable
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| adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的 | |
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55
industrious
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| adj.勤劳的，刻苦的，奋发的 | |
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56
applied
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| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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sporadic
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| adj.偶尔发生的 [反]regular；分散的 | |
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minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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bonnets
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| n.童帽( bonnet的名词复数 )；（烟囱等的）覆盖物；（苏格兰男子的）无边呢帽；（女子戴的）任何一种帽子 | |
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60
dismantled
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| 拆开( dismantle的过去式和过去分词 )； 拆卸； 废除； 取消 | |
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formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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boredom
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| n.厌烦，厌倦，乏味，无聊 | |
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lodgings
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| n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
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64
abiding
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| adj.永久的，持久的，不变的 | |
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65
enlist
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| vt.谋取(支持等)，赢得；征募；vi.入伍 | |
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transparent
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| adj.明显的，无疑的；透明的 | |
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